Samurai Noir
by Torint-kun
Summary: A week after the events of the final episode, Manzo the Saw attempts to find out who killed the world's greatest swordsman.
1. Chapter 1

_I do not claim to own the rights to Samurai Champloo, nor any of the characters thereof. This is work of fiction written for the purposes of entertainment._

Samurai Noir

by Noah Heinrich

Chapter 1

Some Live, Some Die

The light fell in dusty bars from the window, turning the floor into a series of light and showed stripes. I like it this way, because that's how the world works; there is the light, and there is the darkness, always side-by-side, but never overlapping.

My name is Manzo, called Manzo the Saw, because I don't care how sharp my blade is. Or so I'm told, I didn't come up with it. I'm a detective for the shogunate, and I have a reputation for never letting a case go once I start it. I'm tough enough to hold on, and take whatever is dished out to me until the culprit is wriggling helplessly in my hands.

It was a hot and sunny afternoon, the kind that lets the heat in through the back door to rifle your valuables and family portraits. I had just gotten settled into my new posting at Kumamoto, after recovering from the wounds I received in foiling the American invasion. Oddly enough, none of my superiors had ever heard of the invasion, or any country called America, which I suspect may have had something to do with my transfer from Edo.

Ever since my transfer, I'd had two friends who helped me through those troubled times; my jitte and a gourd of sake. The first let me sleep safer, the latter helped me sleep deeper. Honestly, I couldn't tell you if my lack of assignments was causing my alcohol problem, or vice versa, but at that point the question was irrelevent. Officially, I was the head of special investigations for the Kumamoto office, but the only things I investigated in those days was paperwork, and the only special thing about it was the amount of it.

The head of the Kumamoto office was a man, using the word in the loosest sense, by the name of Murakami Kaoru. He was paler than a slug and twice as slimy; he wore his corruption on his sleeve, and it was of general public knowledge that the local Yakuza considered him to be their personal errand boy. In return, they let him keep his job, and slither through his own small-time racketerring gig. Most of my fellow detectives were little more than thugs with badges.

That particular afternoon, I was entertaining myself by watching one of the light stripes chase a shadow up the wall as the sun fell behind the mountains. After several minutes, I determined that the shadow would once again elude it's pursuer, and decided to take a nap. My eyes were not half-closed when the door slid swung open. Through it walked a bad hair cut, a pair of dark glasses, and an insufferable smerk, in that order.

"Good evening, Mr. Detective," said Kagemaru, whose usual look of smugness was momentarily replaced by confusion. "What is that thing you have on the window?"

I regarded the wooden slats that hung over the window, the perpetrators of the shadows that graced my office. "They're called blinds," I told him. "I bought them off a trader, said they were from place called, Benejia, or something."

"Well they're making the place look a tanuki tail, no matter where they're from," he replied, kicking his sandals off and sitting on my desk as if he owned it. Actually, for all I really know about him, Kagemaru may very well have purchased my desk. He was a ninja, an honorless spook who did Edo's dirty work, but other than that, his past and true idenitity were unknown. I would have arrested him on principle, if he were not the only person who could back up my story of the Americans. He could have, but didn't. I massaged my aching temples with my fingertips. "What is it you want Kagemaru? I'm a very busy man these days."

If I had a knife, I could have cut the irony that Kagamaru poured from his eyes. "Riiight… When you can surface from that river of denial you've gone swimming in, I've got a present for you."

"A present? Ninja, there is nothing that you could bring that I could possibly want."

Kagemaru smiled again, or more accurately, he let his teeth show. "So you haven't heard then?"

I took a swill from the gourd, the lukewarm liquid heating my stomach like a boiler. "Heard what?"

"Only the case of the century, my inebriated friend."

That roused me a little. "What do you mean by that?"

He leapt from my desk to the floor, turning a little somersault and spinning so fast it made me want to vomit. "I speak of no less than an impossible murder, a homocide that shall not only shock and amaze you, but leave the entire civilized world flabbergasted and otherwise stupefied."

With that I drew my jitte and rapped it on Kagemaru's wrist. "Out with it already."

He withdrew his hands, smiling as if nothing had happened. "Alright, get this. Several days ago, on a spit of an island called Ikitsuki, Kariya Kagetoki was found dead."

The news struck me like a club. "Kagetoki? You don't mean 'Divine Hand' Kariya Kagetoki, do you?"

"The same."

"But—"

"How do you kill the world's greatest swordsman, is what you were going to ask." I could have killed Kagemaru right there. "How indeed? All I know is that his corpse was found on the island, and that he had been run through the lung with some sort of weapon, probably a katana, but you never know."

I slumped back in my chair a bit. "So why tell me all this? Ikitsuki is, if I'm not mistaken, several miles from here. I don't work for Edo anymore. Why tell this to a washed up provincial?"

Kagemaru leaned in conspiriatorially, his voice lowering. "Wouldn't you like to know? Due to the complications of my chosen profession, I am not at liberty to share too much information with you. All I can say is that I know you well enough to trust that you can find out who killed the greatest swordsman alive." He stood up and walked towards the door. "I've spoken with your superior, Detective. You will have all the time you need to investigate the matter. See 'ya."

I took a day to sober up, collect my belongings, and set my affairs in order before I headed East towards the island. I felt reborn, as if the past four weeks had never happened. Manzo the Saw was back on the beat, tracking down yet another insidious lawbreaker. My head was filled with all sorts of fantasies; of finding the killer, getting my respect and old position back, perhaps even a promotion. The man who killed the ultimate killer, apprehended by the world's greatest detective!

Those kind of thoughts quickly disappeared once I remembered how much I hated travelling, especially in the summer. I sweated buckets all over the road, the heat sapping my energy, making every single step a feat of heroic proportions. I realized then that four weeks of desk work had left me completely out of shape for travel.

If my job paid better, I could have bought a horse, or hired a palanquin, but no, the only detective who isn't wealthy is the one who doesn't take bribes. Typical, absolutely typical.

Other than the terrible pain in my feet, ankles and calves, I arrived in the village across from Ikitsuki Island, I think it's called Tobira, without incident. As I usually did, I began my inquiries at the inn, then the local restaurants, and then I sowly spiralled out towards the rest of the town. The townsfolk were not exactly friendly, but they were more than willing to talk about the time that Kariya Kagetoki passed through, especially a local trader, who lost several bags of rice due to his presence.

What I learned boiled down to this:

1. Kariya had indeed come to Tobira, and had passed on to the island by boat.

2. Before leaving, Kariya dueled two men, one of whom he killed, the other escaping to the island, and should have arrived at the island before Kariya did.

3. Kariya never came back from the island.

It became clear to me that I was not going to learn anything more in Tobira. The people were irritable, the food was bad, and the salt on the air was beginning to make my eyes water, but I knew that I had to sail to Ikitsuki before I could get out of here. I spent the night at the inn, and took the first boat out in the early morning.

After three hours of intolerable rocking, I stumbled onto the island's one dock. I hate sea travel; I always have, and I no doubt will carry this weakness with me to the grave. Perhaps one day it will lead to my undoing, but until that day comes I shall bear it with all of the stoicism I can muster. Unfortunately, I could not muster enough to keep myself from vomiting into the accursed sea that brought me into that wretched state.

After wiping off my mouth, I began to explore the small village that squatted upon Ikitsuki Island's shore like a beggar. It was a desolate little ramshackle of burned out houses, and burned out people. You could tell by looking at any one of them that they had long ago lost the will to truly live. The only thing keeping them going were the ghosts of the ones they lost. I would have felt quite sorry for them, had they not been so damn tightlipped. Never before or since have I met ordinary people so reluctant to speak about anything. For example, I had just barely finished asking a young man how he felt about the weather before he trudged off in the opposite direction, walking like he would never stop until he reached the other side of the island and waded into the surf.

By starts and stops, I managed to piece together what the islanders had seen. Some of the stories seemed completely disjointed, while others contradicted each other entirely. In hindsight of course, most of it makes sense, but as my mentor once told me, "If everyone saw the world through hindsight, we'd be eating soba in the street."

….I don't really know what he meant by that, but I'm sure it was profound. That aside, this is the gist of what I learned on Ikitsuki Island:

Four people came to the island by boat that day: a man with an eyepatch, a man in a wheelchair, a woman wearing pink, and a man matching Kariya's description. The woman kept asking many rude questions, before heading deeper into the island, followed by all of the other visitors. Later that day, there was a massive explosion heard from the Western shore of the island; the bodies of the man with the eye-patch, and what was left of the man in the wheelchair were found there. Kariya's own corpse was found on a cliff not far from that shore, in a pool of what was presumably his own blood. A few days later, the woman in pink, and two unknown, heavily wounded men left the island on the ferry.

I took a seat by a wilting sunflower field, and thought the facts over. Why had Kariya come to Ikitsuki Island in the first place? My first thought was that he was pursuing the second man from his duel, but that man never arrived. Was it for the one-eyed man, or the wheelchair-bound one? No, that didn't make sense, they had died in the explosion, several hundred yards from where Kariya met his end.

Was there anybody else on the island who had skill with a blade? I was told that there was a samurai living on the island, but that he was deathly ill, and had passed on sometime in the last few weeks. This nameless samurai could not have possibly killed Kariya, even if he had been alive during the incident.

That left this mysterious woman in pink, and the two wounded men she left with. Were they the men Kariya had dueled in Tobira? Possibly, but the first had certainly been killed, and nobody had seen the second one arrive. I filed away the two men for later thought.

In fact, the only visitor who had left without heavy injuries was the woman in pink. I doubted that a woman could have possibly defeated the Divine Hand in a duel, but strnger things have happened. If she had fought and killed him, than it wasn't as surprising that she wasn't injured as one might think. Anybody who had witnessed a duel between two master swordsmen can tell you that it is over in an instant; one man is victorious, and the other is dead. Whoever killed Kariya had either fought him in such a duel, or stabbed him in the back. However, Kariya's body had been found on a cliff, far from any cover.

I pondered this for a time, and came to the conclusion that the most likely suspect was this mysterious woman in pink. I had heard rumors of a powerful female assassin not too far from Ikitsuki, who was seen travelling with two men and a young boy. This was too great a coincidence for me to ignore.

It was clear to me; the two men fought Kariya while the woman in pink escaped to the island. Kariya killed one, when the other fled to the island as well. For some reason, that man never reached the island. Kariya had sailed to the island on the next boat, presumably after the woman. On the cliff, they had dueled, and Kariya lost. I wrote off the two men caught in the explosion as probably unrelated.

With that, I put my hat back on and left that hellish island on the first available boat. I watched the sun fall slowly behind the island, as it painted the horizon in shades of blood. My stomach was heaving, but even that was insignificant alongside the pounding of my heart; this was going better than I could have hoped for. I had a crime scene, a few suspects, and most of all, I had a lead. This mysterious female assassin, I was told, had left Tobira for the north as soon as her companions could walk. It had been approximately five days since they were last seen in town; how far could they have gotten?

I lost my self-satisfaction to the waves, along with my lunch.


	2. Chapter 2

_I do not claim to own the rights to Samurai Champloo, nor any of the characters thereof. This is work of fiction written for the purposes of entertainment._

Samurai Noir

by Noah Heinrich

Chapter 2

Some Days, Some Nights

My name is Manzo, known in some circles as Manzo the Saw. Some have claimed that my nickname refers to my snoring, but I know as a matter of absolute fact that I have never snored a day in my life. I sleep lightly, with my jitte in hand, because I never know when a criminal I've brought to justice will come seeking revenge. It is for that reason that I have never been married. It's true.

Rumor in Tobira had it that the three who came from Ikitsuki left after a few days, taking the road to the North. With a word of thanks to the inn-keeper, I took my leave of the little fishing village for good. I wish I could say that the soles of my feet had gotten used to all of this walking, but then I'd be a liar, and if there's one thing I'm not, it's a liar.

I followed the road Northwards for several miles, passing by few people: a man in a palanquin, a messenger, a patrol of soldiers, a woman and a young child who was complaining of a stomach-ache. I tried not to let my irritation show, because children are the other reason I never decided to get married. It's true.

However, that road is also where I ran into my first, and most insidious snag. The road forked into three parts; one that followed the coast, one that led East, and another that went Southeast. I stood at the crossroads, pondering, for what felt like quite a while. If I were a murderer, where would I go? The safest place for a criminal is in the countryside, but many criminals don't do that, preferring to hide in the cities, where they could be among their element. The first road would probably lead to a dock of some kind, which could only go to Honshu; from there, they could go anywhere, but the closest big city is Hiroshima. To the East was Oita, and to the Southwest, there was nothing to speak of.

If the assassin was smart, she'd head Southeast, where nobody would think to look, but experience told me that she'd most likely head towards Hiroshima, where she could then head anywhere else in the country.

"Yo!"

My reverie was interrupted by a trio of woodcutters, each carrying their tools over there shoulders. They walked in unison, and spoke in an odd and yet compelling rhythm. "Hey, did any of you see a woman dressed in pink around here?"

"A honey wearin' pink?"

"Sure we've seen her."

"Runnin' down the road, with a squirrel and a piece."

"Ok…" These three young men were quite clearly deranged. "Well, which way did you see her go?"

"Her posse breezed past…"

"The place you were last…"

"There!"

They all pointed back the way I had come. "Yes, I know that's where she was, I need to know where she's going."

"Hey, don't blame us, we're just a hella sweet team-a…"

"From Hokkaido all the way to Hiroshima!"

"Check it!"

With that, they shimmied off down the road. "Wait! Did you say Hiroshima?" But they had already left. I stopped to think. It wasn't much of a lead, but it was the best I had at the time.

Hiroshima…

Come to think of it, that is where any sensible assassin would flee. I immediately headed Southeast.

The boat ride to Honshu went as expected; I lost control of my fortitude, and lost my lunch on a local magistrate. I lost six precious hours assuring him that I would eventually repay him for his kimono. Officials: corrupt and decadent, the lot of them. A little digested onigiri was the least of what he deserved.

The road to Hiroshima from the coast was crowded with travellers, merchants, and a generous sprinkling of local toughs. They were burly and ungroomed, carrying themselves like roosters, chest first. I didn't give any the satisfaction of starting a fight with me. I had to be subtle, in case the woman in pink was hiding somewhere in this crowd.

Just then, I saw a silhouette in the woods to the side of the road. "Hey! You!" I roared and gave chase, as the figure flitted into the trees. I'm not entirely sure how I knew to pursue this individual, but I've stayed alive long enough to know that my instincts are correct at least two times out of five.

Along with injustice, boats and children, I forgot to mention my long and abiding hatred of trees. All they do is stand there, blocking the view of more important things. As I learned that day, they can also scratch, trip and get in your way during a protracted chase. Better to chop them all down and turn them into useful objects, like fences and clubs.

After some time, the mysterious man stopped, at the base of an especially tall and thick tree, covered with moss, like an unshaved neck. I really do hate trees, but as ugly as they are, they had nothing on this man.

He was covered with burns, bad ones that had only half-healed. I had once seen a man being rescued from a burning house; he had a perpetual bald spot from where his hair had caught fire. This man had no hair at all, and no eyebrows either.

"What do you want?" he asked, as if I were the guilty party here. I pointed my jitte at him, hopefully to put the fear of god into him. Something about his eyes was unnerving. Looking into them was like staring down a bottomless well, in which unknown beasts lurked.

"You will tell me everything you know about 'Divine Hand' Kariya!"

That seemed to catch his attention. "You know of him? Of what he has done?"

"I know he is, and you do too. Come here, I'm taking you into custody!"

"I have committed no crime…"

"You clearly know something about the death of Kariya, that's enough for me."

A spark of recognition flashed across his face, or what was left of it. "He's dead? Damn…" He looked into my eyes, and I am ashamed to admit that I looked away. "You seem like an honest man, so I will tell you. If you want to know the secret of Kariya, find Lady Hotaru, in town. If anybody knows of how he died, it is her." With that, he turned around.

"Wait!"

He looked at me again with those eyes. "I cannot stop. Not yet. Not until I find the source…" And then he vanished into the trees. Did I mention how much I hate trees? I also hate overly cryptic clues from shadowy strangers; they happen more often than you think, and they're a pain in the ass. The shadowy stranger had said that this "Lady Hotaru" would know about Kariya's death; as far as I knew, there were at most three witnesses to Kariya's death, one of them a woman. Lady Hotaru was clearly a pseudonym, and who is more likely to use such a dramatic name than an assassin? With that solved, I went looking for the road.

Three hours later, and I was out of the damned woods, and four hours later I was on the outskirts of Hiroshima, where I spent the next two hours trying to find something out about this Lady Hotaru, which didn't prove that diffficult of a task. Hotaru was quite well known amongst the criminal element of Hirshima, and was, according to the people I questioned in the bars and brothels of the city, a very formidable woman. She apparently had a hand in much of the city's illicit smuggling, (I cursed myself for not looking for smugglers back in Kyushu), and was, most intriguingly, known to have personally fought off several assassination attempts. So, this Lady Hotaru was a powerful warrior in spite of her gender, and had a hand in smuggling illicit. It all made perfect sense; Lady Hotaru's crime racket attracts the attention of the wrong people, who hire the greatest swordsman ever to eliminate her. She flees to Ikitsuki, where Kariya catches up with her. There, they duel, and Hotaru, somehow, vanquishes him. I would have arrested her then and there, had I had any solid proof; proof, yet another unneccesary obstacle in the pursuit of justice.

For the price of several meals, I managed to buy where Lady Hotaru would be that evening; she would be leaving her home to head to the residence of a certain person in the rich district. Who that person was, was unimportant, in the face of my plan. It was simple; when Hotaru passed the tea house I was staying in, which was directly on the way to this house, I would ambush her and force a confession out of her, at which point I would then arrest her. Was I worried about fighting the woman who bested the Divine Hand? Only slightly; it would be dark, I had the element of surprise, and besides, whatever else she was, she was a woman. She would no doubt surrender upon being threatened by a man so strong and masculine as myself.

Time passed, night fell. I admit that I had been feeling more than a little drowsy. What kind of woman goes to a rich man's house in the middle of the night anyway? However, my dilligence paid off. Through a crack in the door, I saw a glimpse of pink silk. I had her! The murderess in pink was about to be apprehended by Manzo the Saw. I drew my jitte, and opened the door, sprinting at the assassin, Lady Hotaru. I was so close—and then her heavy wooden sandal made contact with the side of my head.

The world spun in several directions as once as I toppled to the ground. Looking up, I got my first real look at this Lady Hotaru. The pink silk I saw was attatched to a pink kimono, which was draped around the body… the impressive body of Lady Hotaru. She was tall—very, very tall, and wore the make-up of a courtesan. She was… beautiful. Manzo the Saw had never fallen in love, and never will, but had I fallen in love with Lady Hotaru, which I certainly did not, than I would not be able to stop thinking about her to this very day…

I wasn't thinking very much at the time however, due to the slight concussion that I had just received. "Lady Hotaru?" I mumbled. She looked down at me with what was either pity or disdain, I was not sure which. Or if she was looking down, or up.

"You're that inspector who's been asking around about me?" she said, her voice dripping with what was either irony, or sarcasm.

I managed to get to my feet, still gripping my jitte, which I pointed at her. "You… are to answer for the murder of Kariya Kagetoki, also known as the Divine Hand." I think it was at that point that I swung my jitte at her.

Did you know that women often carry iron fans? I did not know that. I also did not know that they hurt when jabbed into your solar plexus. They do. A lot.

As I lay helpless on the ground I cursed my stupidity, but not aloud. Instead, I said, "As expected of the woman who bested the Divine Hand…"

I had not expected Lady Hotaru to laugh, but laugh she did, and quite musically too. It was a high, flute like laugh, the kind one expects to hear at important functions, by elegant and important people. She looked down at me with infuriating smugness. "You really are a tenacious man, aren't you?"

"You'd better believe it…"

She laughed again. That terrible, beautiful laugh! "I like you, detective, so instead of crushing your windpipe right here…" at that point her sandal was on my throat, "I'll give you a hint: the reason Kariya went to Ikitsuki was to finish the Shimabara Rebellion once and for all."

"What does that mean?" That's what I would have said had I been able to breathe.

"Goodbye detective," she said as she walked away. "Next time you're in Hiroshima, you might want to ask before assaulting me. Though it might cost you extra."

I can honestly say that at that moment, when I was prone, in the dirt, in some alleyway in Hiroshima, that was when I was at my happiest of my life. For it was at that moment in which I had, briefly, seen up Lady Hotaru's kimono. However, her clue was not helpful in the slightest.


End file.
